3/17/13

This post is going to be VERY long, so if you don't care about all the details that took place in the middle, feel free to skip to the end. I like to document the whole process, so I don't forget how much work it was. Funny how time erases those memories. Looking back at some of these pictures brings it all back. :) Actually, now I'm regretting not keeping this remodel more up to date on here, because I'm finding it hard to remember some of the details I told myself I wanted to remember. Early signs of Alzheimer's, no?!

Before - where the computer desk is in this picture, is now part of the laundry room.
We moved that bedroom wall out to where the window is on the right.

Before - can't believe how tiny Ava was. This area is now where our closet is.

Before - this is now our shower and part of the laundry room.

Before

After

Quick run down of what we did.

* Used part of our room and extended the bathroom/laundry room wall out.

* Moved the shower and laundry room wall back to gain a little more open space between the sink and the shower.

* Left the vanity and toilet in the same place.

* By moving the outside bathroom wall we had room for a linen cupboard.

*Turned our old closet into the shower.

*Turned the shower into the closet. Our old shower room had a lot of wasted space. (see the picture of little Ava)

*Moved the laundry room upstairs.

Wow, sounds so easy, doesn't it?! Much easier to type than to actually do it.

Below are a few links from previous posts I did when we first started (which was exactly one year ago). Unfortunately, I didn't document much after a month into the project. Even though we still aren't done with the bathroom, we have been using it since last June. We're slow, but not THAT slow. I've just been slow about putting it on our blog.

Ok, here we go. These are all the pictures I could find since the last time I posted about this bathroom. I'm sure there are more, but I can't find them. Anyway, once we got the shower hot mopped, we finished up most of the sheet rock. The tile went down. The only regret I have with this bathroom is the tile job. We were planning on doing it, and then our plumber (who did great with the plumbing) said he was good at doing tile and would do it for cheap. Well, he wasn't that good. The floors were really uneven (to be expected with this age of house), but I don't think that is an excuse for the uneven tiles. It's not too noticeable to anyone else, I'm sure, but it bugs me. We ended up pulling up some of the tile and replacing them, and we did all the baseboard tiles, so we should have just done the whole thing from the beginning. It still looks nice. It also made me realize that some of our work is just as good, or better, than some of the professionals.

Looking into the bathroom from our bedroom. The pocket door to the left is the laundry room.

We used black pebbles for the bottom of the shower. After they were put in and grouted, we turned on the shower and the water didn't drain. The tile guy didn't want to chip out the old pebbles, so he came and just poured another layer of concrete over the pebbles and re-layed a new batch of peblles (we had to re-order the pebbles - of course, the tile guy had to do the work for free.) The floor ended up being about 5" higher than we planned, but it all worked out in the end. Again, next time we will just do it ourselves.

Next, the cabinets went in. This was probably my favorite part. I designed the cabinets, and couldn't wait to see it in place. Our cabinet guy is really nice, but if you've ever worked with a cabinet maker you will know how ridiculously SLOW they are. We had to bug him almost daily to get stuff done. Even after bugging him A LOT, it took him over 6 months to complete this project. He also did our counter top. It's called Staron, similar to quartz or Corian. I love it. It's very durable. The cabinet isn't quite like I designed it (the cabinet guy sort of made guesses as to what he thought I wanted), but I still really like it.

All our fixtures came from Scholzen Products (my families business in Hurricane). They are the Moen 90-degree series. I REALLY love all the fixtures. I would never fork out the amount of money these are in a retail store, so I am very grateful that I have "access" to these at a very reasonable price.

The light fixture, which is also pretty awesome, was another great find. I found a light I really liked, but it was over $300, no thank-you. I have always had a hard time spending money (just ask my mom, it almost killed me to part with ANY money growing up), so I knew I needed to find something similar to the light I liked, but at a MUCH cheaper price. I checked Overstock, and they had this light which looked almost exactly like the one I was looking for, and it was only $60!!

During all this, Adam and I would spend our nights plastering the walls. I swear we have been plastering walls for over 2 years now. Oh wait, we really have been plastering walls for over 2 years.

This part was the fun part.....when we were starting to get things put into place and functioning (I believe this was May-June). We were sort of racing against the clock at this point, because we had the entire Wilson family coming to stay for the reunion. I think we got the water, toilet and laundry room functioning with only a couple days to spare.

Our dryer vents out the bottom, so Adam had to cut through the tile and fish the vent down through the crawl space below. I think Adam was most excited about the new washer and dryer. Our old ones (which came with the house) worked just fine, but they were the top loading kind, and I can honestly say they do not clean as well as these front loads. Also, we kept noticing little holes in our clothes, which we realized was from the agitator in the old washer. I love having the laundry upstairs next to the bedrooms. So much easier to just walk through that door right to our closet and put clothes away. No, it doesn't make laundry more enjoyable, just a little easier.

Another nice addition to this room, is the fan (right of the light). We added a 'fart fan' (that's what our framer friend calls them), so when I'm running the dryer it doesn't heat up the space.

Starting to come together. So exciting.

Adam got the shower heads in place. Love the big shower and two shower heads. Our entire family can shower together with no problem - TMI, get over it. We have yet to clean some of the grout off the walls. We've moved on to other projects, and find it hard to go back to this one. :)

Our closet turned into the construction dumping ground during this process. We didn't put up shelves in here until WAY later.

Linen cupboard finally put in. It went without shelves and doors for awhile. All our handles were duck tape until I got around to ordering handles.

Hung the mirror. Used the old mirror.

Next we did the tile under the mirror. I actually found this tile at Costco (our floor tile came from Costco as well). It was only about $25 for the back splash. We really did find some great deals during this remodel.

Then, our cabinets above the washer and dryer went in. The counter top sat on top for while. I added some under cabinet motion lights (guess where I got those......yep, Costco).

Things are starting to look finished and nice, but we still had a few problems we needed to solve. See that corner on the right of the shower? The shower tile comes straight out and then the sheet rock angles. We couldn't figure out what to do with this corner, or the left corner, for that matter. We just left it for a long time, until we had the shower glass door guy come to measure for the shower door. He told me that our tile guy sloped the threshold tiles outward, towards the walkway (notice a trend with the tile?). What?!! Anyway, we ended up having to tear off the tile on the step, as well as a couple tiles in the shower that stuck out too far. The glass guy said a solid surface would be better than tile anyway, so we called our cabinet guy and asked him if he could use something similar to our counter top for the shower threshold. He happened to have some spare black Staron from an old job and was able to make us a threshold. He also made some pieces to fit into that right corner. We ended up outlining the entire shower in it. Looks really nice. So, our tile threshold mistake ended up turning out better than what we planned. YEAH!!!

New threshold (outline not on in this picture). Now we can get the glass shower door.

I can't find the other pictures, so enough about the process. Here's what our bathroom looks like now. We love it, and looking at the before pictures makes me REALLY love it. I envisioned this bathroom in my head, and for the most part it turned out just like the picture floating around in my brain. So you don't have to scroll back up, I'll post the befores again.

Shower area before

Shower area now closet - After.

We just used the cheap wire shelving from Home depot for the closet.

I used my old rods (used to hang ribbon and other junk on those) to hang Adam's ties.

Behind the closet door - more old scrapbooking stuff, turned useful (necklaces and bracelets on the hook rod, and earrings and misc. stuff on the magnet bar).

Adam does not like to hang up things on hangers (do any husbands?), so I learned early in our marriage that hooks are the way to go. Why try to change something that can so easily be solved by adding hooks? So, I try to use hooks whenever possible. I added 5 hooks behind the door, so he can hang his pants on them (instead of using the chair in our room - win win for both of us).

The shelves are all the extra shelves from either the entertainment center downstairs, or the linen cupboard that I don't need right now. The closet is a decent size, but because of the window and door, we couldn't put shelves past the belts. We utilized the space with the tie rod and stuff behind the door. Surprisingly all our clothes fit in here (we do use some of the linen cupboard drawers for some clothes). We aren't big clothes people, so that helps too.

Before

Toilet area stayed in the same place. That left wall moved back to open up the walk way some.

After

Did put in a new dual flush (those do exist in America too, Erika) potty, and a fart fan. None of the bathrooms in this house had fans! A much needed function with boys.... alright, and girls. :)

I frosted the window in the potty room, so our neighbors couldn't see us anymore. I just used that paper stuff from home depot that you get wet and scrape on. Works pretty good. Until a couple months ago, we just used a towel in that window.

Love the toilet paper holder. So easy to change the paper, just lift up! Brilliant idea.

Before - closet

After - old closet turned shower.

Another great find. That shower caddy - Restoration Hardware Outlet clearance - originally $100, got it for $20!

Couldn't get a great picture of the shower because of the reflection, but you get the idea.

Linen Cupboard. The glass has sort of a swirly bubble design in it.

Vanity area.

If you can't tell I was going for a spa/clean/modern design. My SIL, Mary, always had white sheets, couches, towels and I thought she was crazy. One day she told me she uses white so she can bleach everything, and it never fades. For some reason I had an epiphany at that moment and realized how smart that was. I love colorful towels and sheets, but never fail they fade and look yucky after awhile. Also, if I only buy white towels they're easy to replace.

We painted the walls and ceilings in kitchen/bathroom paint. Basically pure white high gloss paint. I really like the paint. It's so smooth and pretty thick, so it's super easy to clean and so far shows no signs of mildew.

We changed out the GFI outlets. They have a little light that comes on at night. Very convenient.

More hooks. :)

Laundry Room. The attic access used to be in the old closet, so we had to move it. We just cut that hole there last week. We need to add a door there now.

Everyone told me to get the shelves under the laundry machines, so I don't have to bend over to change laundry, but I love having the counter top. Makes folding clothes so much easier. I'm glad to have the counter over the raised machines. Other than it gives me somewhere to throw my clothes, and makes it easier to leave them there for a few days. :)

Our washer and dryer are LG's. We were looking at a bunch of different ones, thinking they were all the same size. Well, they aren't. We had a very limited size of machines we could put in there, so LG ended up being the shallowest. They were in our top 3 anyway. We had LG's before and loved them. So far, they are awesome.

The counter is sort of a lime green with darker green waves in it. The darker green matches the handles on the cupboards.

Open to the bathroom.

Close the pocket door and it's just my tiny laundry room. I found that skinny laundry basket at IKEA, and it fit perfectly. Even though it's a pretty small laundry room, it's just right for me. I think it's perfect.

Pheww! Did you make it? I really should have kept up better, then that wouldn't have been so painful. :)

We still have quite a bit to do in there for it to be COMPLETELY finished.

Here's my list:

*Paint doors (the pocket door is the only door in the entire house that is painted)

*Casing around window and doors - paint casing

* Door to attic

*Finish tiling by vanity

*Grout baseboard tiles and a few other spots

* Clean grout and seal it it all

* Add a shelf above toilet

*Artwork/pictures on the above mentioned shelf, and above towel hooks (this is where I will bring in different colors)

* One more layer of paint on laundry room ceiling

* Paint mural on laundry room wall (I finally know what I want to do on that huge wall)

*Backsplash in laundry room (using same as in bathroom)

*Rug in laundry room

* Carpet in closet (this will go in when we carpet the rest of the house)

Still a lot to do, but we've come A LONGGGGGG WAY!!!!!

We love how our bathroom/laundry room turned out. It was a ton of work, but now that it's pretty much over we are enjoying it.

I should learn from my mistakes of not updating as we go, and get caught up on all our other projects. We'll see how that goes. We've done a lot since we moved on from the bathroom. Currently we are knee deep in the middle of a kitchen renovation.

Did I not comment on this post? I am a slacker, we've certainly talked enough about your bathroom around here! Love the shower especially! Our bathrooms are next on our list, and yours is definitely an inspiration. We can do it! :)Can't wait to see what you've got going next!